【Editor's Note】
Located in the center of China's north-south coastline, Shanghai is the choke point of the Yangtze River into the sea.
Shanghai is born of the sea, thrives on the sea, and expands by the sea. Throughout the ages, the development of Shanghai has been nourished and influenced by marine culture. From the perspective of marine culture, Shanghai has experienced changes in urban forms such as Jiangnan fishing villages, domestic trade ports, Far East shipping centers, and international shipping centers.
Culture is the soul of the city, marine intangible cultural heritage is an important carrier of Shanghai's marine culture, is a valuable cultural heritage left by the ancestors, in the context of comprehensively enhancing the soft power of Shanghai city and building a "humanistic city" in 2035, it is time to discuss the protection and inheritance of Shanghai's marine intangible cultural heritage in depth.
Standing at a new starting point in 2022, The Paper launched a special report on "Shanghai's Sea and Marine Intangible Cultural Heritage "Shanghai" People", through a series of short films, leading Pengyou into the work and life of non-hereditary inheritors, tasting the charm of marine intangible cultural heritage, and exploring the profound significance of "sea" in Shanghai.
Episode 2 "Fengxian Rolling Lights" Director: Zhao Chenlin Photography: Zhao Chenlin, Wang Yijiang Editor: Zhao Chenlin (07:18)
Wang Zhengrong first came into contact with rolling lamps in the 1980s, and today, in his 70s, he is still walking on the road of Fengxian rolling lamp inheritance. To others, he seems to be an all-rounder, not only responsible for guiding the roller lamp lovers in Garlin Town (located in Fengxian District, Shanghai), but also doing one-stop service such as rolling lamp making, creation, editing, and repair. Under his skillful hand, the rustic rolling lamp becomes a shining garnet culture business card. "Throw the candle in the air, push the ball lightly." Fan Chengda's poem describes the superb skills of the rolling lamp performers. Nowadays, Fengxian rolling lamps have moved from ancient to modern, from simple to fashionable, from rural fields to city squares, and Wang Zhengrong, the inheritor of the municipal level, has made an indispensable contribution.
The following is the self-statement of Wang Zhengrong, the municipal inheritor of Fengxian Rolling Lamp——
Love lights
I have loved folk music and dance since I was a beginner, and I had my uncle make me an ore gramophone, two small ore earplugs, and tuck them in my ears to listen to. When I was a child, I lived in The Town of Fahua in the Huqiao Area, where there are City God Temples and Nun Temples, and at half a month in September in the countryside, the temple will hold street activities, called "old masters going out of the meeting". The "old man out of the meeting" had to pass through the town, and I saw folk activities such as rolling lights, dragon dances, swinging lake boats, and clam lamps. At that time, the rolling lamp was very simple, or the primary color of bamboo chips. The roller performers toss huge balls, catch them with bamboo boards in their mouths, and occasionally flip the ball upwards. This trick "spider silk" caused a round of applause and cheers from the crowd. In the complicated folk performances, I was only impressed by the rolling lights.
Fengxian rolling lamp, from the outside there is nothing unique, is a round bamboo cage, but its performance form is very unique. Rolling lamps come from the folk, inherited from the folk, its local atmosphere is rich, the performance form is bold and free, the routine action is delicate in the extensive, the movement is quiet, and the static is moving. The rolling lamp performance incorporates many modern sports and dance movements, focusing on jumping, rolling, climbing, channeling, turning, spinning, soaring, jumping, throwing and other sports dance movements that are strong and soft.
Our ancestors gave each movement a figurative and poetic name, such as "carp rolling water grass" where a person lies on the ground, rolling lights around the body, and the human body falls together, like a carp eating aquatic grass. There are also "white cranes laying eggs", "partridge soaring into the sky", "golden monkey playing balls" and so on, all of which fly in the sky, walk on the ground, and swim in the river. Every action is vivid and implying auspiciousness, happiness and consummation.
In the early 1980s, when the town was going to participate in the "Shanghai Township Enterprise Employees' Literary and Art Show" street activity, as the staff in charge of rehearsals in the town, I was always thinking about how to make the performance more brilliant. The image of the rolling lights of my childhood jumped out of my mind.
Historically, the rolling lights in the Fengxian area were little famous and were local characteristic cultures. According to ancient records, when the Taiping Army came to the Fengxian Garnet Forest area, the people used a unique rolling lantern dance to express their joy.
We drew twenty strong men from the town and organized a temporary rolling lamp workshop. The original roller lamp was very large, up to a meter and a half in diameter, and weighed sixty or seventy pounds. When dancing headlights, the physical exertion is extremely large, and it is not easy to dance, and the arm strength, waist strength, and leg strength are exquisite. Each rolling lamp requires several people to take turns dancing, and the performers are tall, tall, tall, and strong, most of them are naked, reflecting a rugged power beauty. The reputation of the "king of lights" of the rolling lamp is not a waste of time.
Wang Zhengrong is rehearsing a show for the rolling lantern team
We dug up "masters" in the folk and invited two "old mages" to teach the original Fengxian rolling lamp technique. Chen Bomin and Wu Boming are the third generation of Fengxian rolling lamps, and are a generation of technical authority and distinctive characteristics. Naturally, I did not miss a good opportunity to "steal a teacher to learn art". At that time, I was in my thirties, my physical strength was not as good as before, and it was difficult to learn for free.
When organizing the performances to learn, I am responsible for seeing if the movements are neat. After the study, I took the rolling lamp to practice by myself, recalling the rolling lamp action taught by the teacher, and tirelessly cutting the details. After a few hours, my hands began to blister, because I was going to grasp the bamboo strips, and the blisters were quickly crushed. After practicing for a few days, I got calluses on my hands. Once, I was throwing the rolling lamp from left to back, and the thick calluses on my hands were brushed off by bamboo pieces, and the palms of my hands were immediately blurred with blood and flesh. It hurt, but I didn't give up practicing. Once I fall in love with a rolling lamp, I can devote myself to it with infinite enthusiasm.
lighting
In the street activity of "Shanghai Township Enterprise Employees' Literary and Art Performance", the rolling lantern performance team shined brightly. This performance also made Fengxian Rolling Lantern a hit and was loved by the people. Since then, there have been no less than 40 rolling lantern performances per year. After 1990, we started innovating. Although in the first ten years we had a lot of rolling lights, the limitation was that there were few participants, all of whom were manly dance rolling lights. In the 1990s, there was no such thing as "intangible cultural heritage" in China, but we have realized that we must increase the visibility of rolling lights, enrich performance forms, and let ordinary people experience rolling lights. Therefore, at that time, the county cultural bureau arranged for Teacher Xu Siyan to help us develop the culture of rolling lamps, and after consulting with Teacher Xu, we first arranged the program of small rolling lamps, and the diameter of small rolling lamps was only about 36 centimeters. Later, we innovated the middle rolling lamp, inheriting the action of the large rolling lamp, and also having the flexibility of the small rolling lamp.
We have been keeping pace with the times and constantly innovating and innovating in lamps and lanterns. From kindergarten dolls to the elderly in their seventies and eighties, all kinds of people can participate in our rolling lamp activities, such as grandpa and grandma can do rolling lamp exercises, and the music rhythm is slightly slower. The middle-aged and elderly rolling lantern exercise in Garlin Town was choreographed by me. The choreographed movements are not only not separated from the characteristics of traditional rolling lights, but also integrate the fashion sense of square dance. Before the promotion of the rolling lamp exercise, the grandfathers were more willing to play mahjong and less to participate in literary or sports activities, but in a roller skating competition, I unexpectedly found that 8 of the 20 teams were spontaneously formed by the grandfather, which also showed that our rolling lamp exercise was widely welcomed by the masses.
After years of tempering and innovation, there have been a number of sets of rolling lamp dances and rolling lantern exercises suitable for different occasions and showing different techniques, and have frequently appeared on the large-scale cultural stage in China. The current rolling lamp performance realizes the performance of men and women on the same stage, and the powerful large rolling lamp is combined with the soft small rolling lamp performance, and more than 20 actions such as the rolling dragon and the goose spreading its wings have been innovated. We are now also exploring the innovation of the rolling lamp body situation, in addition to the conventional rolling lamp, there are "water meteor", "cold flame rolling lamp", "quick-release rolling lamp" and other styles, suitable for different performances. As the flower of folk art nurtured by Shanghai, Fengxian rolling lamp is giving new brilliance.
The rolling lamp is attractive with the lamp. We go out to perform now, and people first ask if there is a light on the rolling lamp, and if the rolling lamp does not turn on, no one is happy to watch. The demands of the masses are also constantly rising. Since the candle is lit in the middle of the traditional rolling lamp, once it dances, the candle is extinguished, and I began to wonder how to make it continue to shine as it dances.
I ran all over town to find an LED light that also shone under stage lights, but could only be connected to 220 volts, which was too dangerous to use for performances. I specially went to the electronic mall in downtown Shanghai, bought a LED strip that can be connected to direct current, and then equipped with wires and batteries, and tinkered with it myself, and it was not easy to develop a "mobile dry battery LED lamp". A layer of Chinese red cloth is placed on the bread outside the lamp, which makes the rolling lamp look more festive and auspicious.
In the process of practice, there is still another problem, how to fix the LED lights? The performers danced twice, and the light strip actually fell off the middle of the rolling lamp, and the wire was torn off. The centrifugal force of the rolling lamp dance coupled with the elasticity of the bamboo strip, sometimes people still have to sit on the rolling lamp, and it is no wonder that the lamp belt is broken. By experimenting with fixing materials of different materials, I finally chose a rubber band. The rubber band is full of elasticity, can relieve the impact force, and can be fixed in the middle, and finally avoid the problem that the light strip is always broken due to vibration.
At the same time, I also carefully designed the outer packaging of the rolling lamp, and wrapped the log-colored bamboo strips with colored paper. I have tried to paint the wooden strips and wrap them with matte paper, but in the end, I chose to wrap the big roller lamp with golden laser paper and wrap the rolling lamp with silver and white laser paper, which can not only make the rolling lamp reflect the stage lights, make the performance dazzling, but also increase the "life" of the use of the rolling lamp. From cutting to pasting, I basically did it alone. Just giving a sticker to a big rolling lamp would take a day. I also bought tools such as soldering irons and glue and repaired the rolling lamps myself. After taking many detours, I finally succeeded in the end, and there was also a kind of vigor and tenacity.
Rolling lamp is a window for the external publicity of Fengxian folk culture and is a brand project. So I will always maintain the image of the brand. From the outer packaging to the lights on the inside, I keep them shiny. I'm in my seventies now, and I've been associated with the rolling lights for over forty years, and as long as I can move, I'm going to let the rolling lights sparkle on the stage.
Pass the lights
In 2006, all parts of the country began to apply for the national intangible cultural heritage list. In order to sort out the historical context and artistic characteristics of the development of Fengxian rolling lamps, I went around in this year, flipped through all kinds of materials, including local chronicles, and also ran through large and small villages in the Garlin area to convene elderly people over 60 years old to hold a symposium. In addition, in the past 20 years, I have personally participated in many popularization and promotion activities of rolling lamps, understand the characteristics, practical significance and social benefits of rolling lamps, and have a good grasp of writing application materials.
In 2008, Fengxian rolling lamp was included in the "National Intangible Cultural Heritage Protection List", after which I also focused more on the inheritance of rolling lamps. I put forward the slogan of "full coverage of the rolling lamp project, one village and one product to create characteristics", so every village committee and neighborhood committee in Garlin Town has set up a cultural and sports team to participate in the rolling lamp project, and I also want to create a rolling lamp dance and a rolling lamp exercise for them. I have been to the neighborhood committee and village committee of the whole town, because I have to personally counsel the masses, so that they can learn to roll the lights faster, and also promote the success of the show and competition. Before the epidemic, we organized at least two competitions every year, and on the eve of the New Year, we also organized a special parade of rolling lights to create as many platforms as possible for the people to show their style.
Wang Zhengrong tutored the villagers to learn to roll the lamp
I got a taste of the sweetness from "Rolling lights into the community." Without the participation of the masses, there is no vitality in any intangible cultural heritage. In the rolling of the lantern activities, people can continue this memory of traditional culture. In addition to organizing the "Intangible Cultural Heritage in the Community", the Rolling Lantern Art Festival, and the large and small folk rolling lantern activities, I also bring the rolling lights to the campus. Sometimes I can't be in charge of multiple school rolling lamp training classes alone, and I will also invite excellent students of adult rolling lamp training classes to teach.
Now I advocate the development of cultural industries and the development of cultural and creative products, so I designed a rolling lamp sachet so that more people can walk into the rolling lamp, understand the rolling lamp, and inherit the art of the rolling lamp. Parents and children come to participate in the rolling lamp activity, I will first take the children to the rolling lamp showroom to learn about the history of the rolling lamp, and then teach them to make a light and cute mini roller lamp. A rolling lamp sells for 50 yuan, and also teaches children how to make a rolling lamp sachet.
In recent years, I have also established the "Wang Zhengrong Intangible Cultural Heritage Studio", which is mainly to excavate and sort out the excellent traditional culture such as the intangible cultural heritage of the Garlin area, develop relevant courses, enhance its new connotation and new value, and also cooperate with the government to carry out training activities for the inheritance team, or guide the excellent cultural inheritance of villages, enterprises and institutions, and schools.
Wang Zhengrong rehearses a rolling lantern exercise for students at Huqiao School Photo by Zhao Chenlin
In the process of inheriting the rolling lights, talent mining is always a difficult point, and I am trying my best to keep the rolling lights performance team young. Today's young people have their own jobs, and they can only take time out of the evening to participate in rolling light study classes. There are young people who love to roll the lights, and they say that as long as I tell them in advance the time of training, performance or competition, they are willing to take time off to participate in the event.
There are also some new Fengxian people who have slowly integrated into the new environment through rolling lights, and they have taken the initiative to ask to participate in the study class, and I guess they are also literary and artistic activists in their hometown. Today, I also select successors among these young and good seedlings to inherit and innovate the Fengxian rolling lamp culture together.
In fact, since the 1980s, Fengxian's local culture has flourished, and our fengxian mass literary and art workers have begun to excavate various local folk customs, and have also carried out census, collation and innovation of the art of rolling lamps, and rescued the "Fengxian rolling lights" that are on the verge of being lost. On the road of inheritance, the group of literary workers have been baton after baton, and I have just done the work within my share and insisted on doing the cause I love.
(This article is based on Wang Zhengrong's oral account, and the photos in the text are provided by Wang Zhengrong himself unless otherwise noted.) ）
Poster Design: The Paper, Zhu Bichen